Intuitive Machines

Intuitive Machines

Intuitive Machines is a Houston-based space company listed on the Nasdaq as LUNR. Founded in 2013, it develops lunar landers under NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services programme, along with lunar communications and navigation infrastructure, orbital services and engineering work for government customers. It describes itself as a space infrastructure company rather than a launch company; it does not build rockets, and its landers fly on other operators’ vehicles.

Business and Financial Position

For the second quarter of 2026, ended 30 June 2026, Intuitive Machines reported record quarterly revenue of $206.2 million, more than four times its second-quarter 2025 revenue, at a 17.4 percent gross margin.

Backlog reached a record $1.8 billion at the end of the quarter, an increase of $1.5 billion from year-end 2025. The company booked $920 million of awards in the quarter and a further $300 million in the third quarter to date.

The revenue mix has shifted sharply. Second-quarter revenue was 38 percent civil including grant revenue, 32 percent commercial and 30 percent national security. The company noted that national security had grown from 3 percent of revenue in the second quarter of 2025 to 30 percent a year later.

Why It Matters

The national security shift is the story in these numbers. A company founded around NASA lunar delivery has, within a year, made defense and intelligence work nearly a third of its revenue — a change that says more about where US space budgets are going than any single contract would.

The caution is that lunar landing remains genuinely hard, and this company’s own record shows it. Both of its landings so far have ended early because the spacecraft came to rest at the wrong angle. IM-1’s Odysseus broke a leg on touchdown in February 2024 and settled over at an angle, operating six days. IM-2’s Athena landed on its side inside a crater near Mons Mouton in March 2025, roughly 250 metres off target; with its solar cells badly oriented the batteries drained and the mission ended in under 13 hours against a planned 10 days.

Backlog of $1.8 billion against quarterly revenue of $206.2 million means most of the value here is still promised rather than delivered, and collecting it depends on execution against a manoeuvre the company has not yet completed cleanly.